I guess the question is very much Therion-related, because he is the guy that made the Spanish part of "Quetzalcoatl", but how is he in other ways related to the band and to occultism? I mean, last night I was watching the Latin American spirituallity and curiosities channel (Infinito), and suddenly this guy Martin Fernandez Cufre appears explaining something about Magick. In the program he was defined as a psycologist, but I wondered how could he actually be realted with all this stuff if he is just a psycologist?

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"All men are intellectuals, but not all men in society have the function of intellectuals" -Antonio Gramsci

Hi One,Unfortunately I don't know who this guy is, and I don't have Infinito here in Canada in order to "investigate" a little bit more. I don't know either what is his relation with Therion and why he only translated such limited lyrics while he could do a better job. I mean, let's face it, there is so much to say about Quetzalcoatl and the lyrics of that song does not reflect that at all.

On the other hand, I can tell you that there is a lot of psycologists, psychiatrist and psy-something involved in occult things... you know: New Age, Kaballah, meditation, bioenergetics, and even sorcellery and shamanism. And Infinito is the perfect place to see them all talking about those subjects. Now-a-days, the psy-somethings are not only limited to work with "crazy" people... they are more open-minded than we all might think.

Hi people. I'm the "guy" you talk about. I translated the Quetzalcoatl lyrics and appeared in a couple of programmes of a TV show called "Magic" transmitted through the Latin American "esoteric" and/or "pseudoesoteric" and/or "spiritual" and/or whatever cable channel Infinito.

1) What's the big deal with me "being" a Psychologist and being interested or linked to occult stuff? I mean, am I not a human being just by having a certain university degree? Does "being" a Psychologist (having a Psychology degree) forbid one to be interested and/or involved in occult-related people or practices? I appeared in the TV programme because an acquaintance of mine did the planning and asked me if I could talk a bit about chaos magic and Dragon Rouge, both of which she knew I had some involvement with. I'm not quite a "fan" of Infinito, they have a lot of crap material, but also some very interesting things. In one of the programmes I talked about chaos magic (they devoted almost the entire timespan of that program to chaos magic) and in another program I talked about Dragon Rouge.

2) I don't understand what Aluqak means when talking about "translating such limited lyrics when he could do a better job". I translated that because Christofer asked me to do it, just that little bit, the chorus, and not the whole song. What did you expect me to do, to "reflect it all"?

Psychologists are human beings. It might be a bit too much philosophical, but be attentive to the traps of language. If a person receives a university degree for studying Psychology, that doesn't turn him/her into something entirely different. There are lots of different Psychologists, working in MANY diffferent fields (you wouldn't believe how many). In fact, there are areas of Psychology dealing with spiritual matters (Transpersonal Psychology, the Integral Model of Ken Wilber, just to name a couple) and there's Parapsychology, which now has a lot of serious researchers all over the world.

I am NOT a Psychologist if you just mean that I "AM" an abstract entity. I'm a person, I studied Psychology, I also work with languages (translating), I also like playing and recording music, writing, and a thousand other things.

Hello Martin, and welcome to the forum.In first, I never said you were forbidden to practice occultism, I just wondered how you were related to magick and to Therion itself, thank you for clearing the doubts.Second, I'm not even 15 yet, man, don't take it too seriously. We never meant to make you angry.Third, I do agree that the chorus of Quetzalcoatl could've been better, but I am at least grateful the band did the wonderful music and used our language in the song.

« Last Edit: August 22, 2006, 03:42:33 am by The One »

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"All men are intellectuals, but not all men in society have the function of intellectuals" -Antonio Gramsci

I wasn't "angry" about the posts at all... heh! Sorry if it sounded that way... no problem at all!!!

What do you mean that it could've been better? That the translation could've been better? I had to keep some parameters, mainly in the length of the sentences, due to the voice-music synchronization, so possibly that's why it didn't sound too well in Spanish if that's what you mean.

first of all: Welcome to the forum! I'm glad to have someone with a closer view on the occult topics here.

I suppose the others are a bit dissatisfied with the "Quetzalcoatl" lyrics per se, with the way Thomas treated this topic, and not with your translation. At least, that`s how I understood them.

Regarding psychology and occultism: Can't we view occultism as a highly subjective, non-scientific approach to psychological questions and problems? Oh, and didn't C.G.Jung, one of the fathers of modern psychology, deal with topics we'd view as occult today? Just think of the Sermones ad Mortuous...

Cheers!

Markus

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Antichrist! Antichrist!Opera music therionised. Antichrist Superstar! Eager to hear you is what we are.

Thanks for the welcome. OK, yes, maybe the Quetzalcoatl lyrics are a bit simple, but maybe that's what was intended. I mean, you don't have to state a whole mystico-mythical theory in a lyric to make it good, right? In fact, you don't have to do anything, I think.

We can view occultism (and if we want some kind of mutual understanding, we'd have to agree on what does that expression mean) as whatever we want. Excuse me if you feel dissatisfied with my radical maybe relativistic view, but it's interesting to see the illusions in language whenever we think we're talking about "things" (such as a rock or a glass) and, I think, really we're talking about abstract notions mainly constructed culturally. What is occult? Dark sinister thingies? Demons screaming? What are demons? Secret rituals and words? Well, I have then "esoteric rituals" with my girlfriend every time we put names to things that noone else know... Or any "private" sphere of human action could be seen then as esoteric. Also, from my current point of view and experience, I do "occult" things in broad daylight, sitting looking at a wall, or doing "usual" things, and I'm not dressed in black with a robe covering my head mysteriously. Is "occult" referred to mythical notions and characters, such as great gods and stuff? There are "magicians" today who claim to do magic by invoking such popular characters as Pikachu (Pokemon) or using "archetypes" from Star Trek. You see, this, as usual, is a hugely varied sphere. You choose your own flavor in this field, and it's interesting to see what one chooses. Anyway, I'm more "mystically" incline lately... meaning by that a value of the "underlying" nothingness/fullness beyond all things, including magic and that stuff.

Anyways, on a more musical note... anyone ever heard Lake of Tears? One of my life's sadnesses will be to never see this band live. These guys are from Sweden and play in Europe, I'm in Argentina, and going to Europe is incredibly expensive now... alas...

A little deail I'd like to add about the occult and esoteric. My experience is that occult practices seem to open a possibility (that is, not everyone involved in occult is actually doing that, from my point of view) of interacting with whatever is "reality" in anomalous and non-ordinary ways. You could say that smoking a joint achieves the same effect, I don't think it's the same. My experience is that one seems to be able to induce certain effects in actual reality by entering into specific consciousness states and "operating" there in certain ways, and also perceive in anomalous ways, and other processes also. As in everything in this mysterious life, it seems to be a prism... you enter there, and can come out with different results: you can go crazy, become even more neurotic than usual, achieve "magical" effects, become religious, experience mystical states, change your life entirely, expand your "consciousness", reduce it, evade your life's dark spots, face them straight on, etc etc etc... But it's not all just "make believe", it's not just subjective mumbo jumbo, or at least it can be quite real.

And yes, Jung was quite drawn by the esoteric and occult. He worked a lot based on alchemical notions, some say he even went wacko with that stuff, also with paranormal processes, gnostic stuff, etc. His "Septem Sermones ad Mortuos" are very interesting. And his "normal" psychology is very interesting indeed.

Hi Martín, and welcome to the forum (again ). I've been away for a couple of weeks and missed most of this "conversation", but here I am to give you my answer.Now that I have re-read my sentence, I think it is indeed misleading about my critique to the lyrics themselves, and not about your translation (such things happen when you write in a hurry ). However, I think Markus ressumed very well the point I wanted to make :

I suppose the others are a bit dissatisfied with the "Quetzalcoatl" lyrics per se, with the way Thomas treated this topic, and not with your translation.

. I really like some of Thomas' lyrics, but in my opinion, he could have done a better job in Quetzcoatl. I mean, I know that the lyrics of a song are not intended to replace a history course or to give you the whole mystical and religious perspective growing around a myth, and that they don't have to be very complex to be "good". However, I still think that this particular subject (Quezacoatl) "deserved" something more elaborated. That's just my opinion... and a fan opinion in the top of that .About your translation... I just cannot judge it. Especially given that I don't have the original text that Christofer sent you, and given that I myself am far from being an interpreter or "translator". Thus, I'll be just happy to see that somebody was availble to do the job .Was the song intended to be way? Of course!, knowing how Christofer works, I'm sure he would have never dared to release a song that was not intended to be the way it was released. But, in any way my opinion stands the same, I think the lyrics themsleves could have been better. Anyway, sorry for the misunderstanding.

On the other hand, I don't remember if you actually answered the initial question. Do you have a particular relationship with Chris and Dragon Rouge, or you are just a fan, collaborator.... whatever ?And concerning the "occult" practices and the interactions with anomalous and non-ordinary ways. Can you please elaborate a little bit more? I've got pretty interested into "parallel-realities", to give them a name, lattely.

On the other hand, I don't remember if you actually answered the initial question. Do you have a particular relationship with Chris and Dragon Rouge, or you are just a fan, collaborator.... whatever ?And concerning the "occult" practices and the interactions with anomalous and non-ordinary ways. Can you please elaborate a little bit more? I've got pretty interested into "parallel-realities", to give them a name, lattely.

Dear Aluqak,

you want to know too much, don't you? As I know, "occult" means "secret" or "hidden", so let's keep the secrets (But if Martin wants to answer, I'm very curious too )

I totally agree that it's vastly important to share definitions of our expressions, because I've had too many discussions which turned out to be sheer misunderstandings: Actually all participants had the same views, but they didn't realize that because each had different expression. What I meant to ask was whether you'd agree that occultism is a non-scientific approach to psychological questions. Your second reply to me seems to show that you view it as more.

You may have noticed that I'm a very rational person, so I do not believe in direct magical effects that would be as real as a natural force. You can't make a stone float in midair against the natural laws by magic. However, I will not argue that occultism even in my limited definition above will have real effects: Whatever we believe, whatever subjective experiences we make will change our behaviour. Thus even the most subjective experience can have very objective results.

Cheers!

Markus

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Antichrist! Antichrist!Opera music therionised. Antichrist Superstar! Eager to hear you is what we are.

Aluqak -> If you're curious, well, I was a member of Dragon Rouge for some time, then moved a bit away. Now I collaborate in some aspects and who knows? Maybe I'll be back for more! As for "alternative realities" and altered states, well, it's a huge subject. It may interest you to check out some material on "chaos magic". It's one of the most recent views in magic, in which in general the notion is that apart from the "symbolic systems" (be it Hebrew Qabalah, Tantrism, or even Star Trek, whatever makes your motivation move), the key to anomalous interactions with reality (be it our own personal "reality" which we call "oneself" or the "world outside") are some altered states of consciousness. A lot of talk can be done about "how" this works, but what chaos magicians care about is that it actually works. To put it differently, consciousness seems to be able to interact with reality at deep layers. Peter Carroll, one of the creators of the chaos approach, made an interesting "quantum-based" model of chaos magic, it's interesting for those inclined and attracted by that sort of schemes (maybe more rationally-oriented). There's also quite some scientific material in these areas, one interesting source is Princeton's PEAR Lab, they have a web site if you're interested. From my point of view, well, I'm not in a moment in which I'd like to use too precise language, because you eventually turn out to see in which way symbolic/mental representations of the workings of reality can be illusory. My little advice: if you're interested and intrigued, try it, but don't buy any BS that anyone tries to sell you as the ultimate truth for this (and incidentally, this applies to everything). Nobody has the ultimate key for these matters, but some sources can provide you with tools which can be useful. For a specific person in a specific moment a magical order might be useful, for others some more rational or scientific approach, for others a more mystical approach. Eventually, the thing is that reality is not what we're quite used to accept as it. It is far more malleable and what are considered "laws" are not at all unchangable patterns. Based on Pete Carroll's "Chaos Magic Theory", I could say that those so-called "laws" are self-repeating patterns in a general morphogenetic field (check out Rupert Sheldrake's work for more on this) of reality, with a very strong tendency to occur, but which may be twisted or changed. Heck, Pete Carroll even suggests that you can cheat the past and change things occuring now based on changing a "past event", that is, if you can. This may sound as quack to you, but eventually a lot of supposedly accepted things turn out as "quack". I suggest you someting else: Robert Anton Wilson's "Cosmic Trigger I: Final Secret of the Illuminati".

Markus -> Yes, some at least approximate definition is interesting when talking about these things. Although in my experience, if people are "in sync" and sensing themselves and their expressions, it's not necessary to be so stringent on mental concepts. It's like digital or analogic recording. Digital has some preciseness which only 1s and 0s can provide, at high sampling rates, but analogic stuff has something else related to vibration and resonation which is not in digital. As for "natural laws", I wrote something about that in the last paragraph, that's approximately how I see it now. But you're referring to how subjective "beliefs about reality" can induce some changes in one's behaviour. Yes, of course, that's hugely important, but the suggestion is that there's more to it. That if your "consciousness operation" is in some way, and in some states of consciousness, you can actually influence and produce physical effects by non ordinary methods. If you choose to believe that "a stone cannot float in air", ok, that's you, and if it works for you, ok, but I'd suggest you to leave some open doors to possibilities. If you want to do some quick experimenting, try the "Creative Visualization" method. No rituals there, just relaxation and mental visualization, and a clear mind about what you want! Check out for changes in the world around you!

being somewhat weak at visualization I'd even prefer a ritual for an attempt. Perhaps some simple one... I might check Karlsson's "Uthark" once more since I quite like the runes. Unless, of course, you recommend something different to a beginner.

Still, any changes I'd achieve could only be regarded as an interesting experience, not as an objective proof. Whatever I will notice - noone could distinguish between a real effect of magick and a mere attention effect (ever noticed how many red cars pop up in the streets out of nowhere once you buy a red one?) or sheer coincidence. Leading a waterproof proof is up to scientists like yourself (and would earn you a million, by the way - the Randy price).

Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to talk down any experience anyone made. To the contrary! I'm highly interested in making such experiences myself. I'm just being careful about the conclusions and the explanations for them.

Cheers!

Markus

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Antichrist! Antichrist!Opera music therionised. Antichrist Superstar! Eager to hear you is what we are.

Heheh Markus, well, I'm not that of a scientist. I like to see it as one of my "aspects" or "selves". Sometimes I like the "evidence" notion, and then, as you say, sometimes it's just a matter of something making an experience interesting.

I'd recommend you to do just what you like, what triggers your motivation and imagination, whether it's the runes or whatever. In general, then, I'd say that one has a certain "inner compass" which gives indications of whether one is completely "missing it" and going "astray" or not. Just that... do what you feel is interesting and appealing for you, and then be attentive to yourself and your general condition. Some people get obsessed with whatever (runes, religion, magic, work, etc) tending to believe that somehow that will liberate or empower them eventually. For me, at least for now, it's more something of the here-and-now, there are the keys, right now, right here... and yes I mean NOW. No belief in anything per-se will eventually liberate or empower you. If you feel you're completely off-balance and off-track in a personal sense, I don't know if that would make any sense for you in that moment, and getting obsessed with it leads to even more "losing it", like a downwards spiral.

Heh, I'd encourage that "being careful about the conclusions and explanations", that's a key!

And as "Pope" Bob Wilson prints in his erisian cards, "do what you like, enjoy what you enjoy, and don't take crap from anybody" (and that includes me or whoever)